Under Your Skin
by Sauron Gorthaur
Summary: Bog and Sunny still just don't know how to get along. When the two of them wake up in each other's bodies, the goblin and the elf have to find a way to work together and break the spell... A story for the Freaky Friday theme of Strange Magic week.
1. Be the Bigger Man

**Under Your Skin  
** **by Sauron Gorthaur**

Part 1: Be the Bigger Man

"OK seriously, can you watch the wings, man? That's like the third time you've whacked me in the last ten minutes!"

"Maybe you should stay out of my way, elf. I've nearly tripped over you three times in the last _five_ minutes."

"Uh, Sunny, the name is Sunny."

"Whatever."

The spring storms had hit the Fairy Meadows particularly hard this year, and the one last night had taken off several roofs in the elfish village, including the one on Sunny's cottage. Dawn of course had immediately offered to help with the repairs and had additionally volunteered both her sister and her sister's boyfriend.

Which was all well and good, except for the fact that Sunny and the Bog King's relationship was still a bit prickly. Which was putting it mildly.

The girls were away at the moment, getting more supplies for the patching job, leaving their boyfriends to work on the damaged framework of the structure. Bog was laying down the new reed frame while Sunny used a length of twine to tie the reeds together, making a crosshatch pattern across the hole in Sunny's roof. The cottage was not large to begin with, and with half the roof gone, it was a tad cramped. Again, putting it mildly.

Sunny tried to scoot backwards out of Bog's way to work on the next crosshatch and accidentally put a knee down on the goblin's wing. Bog snarled and snapped at him. "Watch it! Can't you go two seconds without running into me?"

Sunny threw his hands up. "Maybe if you weren't so freakishly tall, I'd have more places to step. I didn't ask to have a walking tree on my roof!"

Bog growled. "Well, at least I'm not the size of an acorn with no wings and the arm's reach of pill bug. I'd be done already if I didn't have you dodging around between my feet."

"And _I'd_ have the job done already if I wasn't having to watch out for your noodle limbs spread out all over the place. And anyway, it's my house!"

"What would you do? Sing at it and hope it magically fixes itself?"

"It's better than what you'd do without my help, which is throw a tantrum at it and hope that scares it into fixing itself!"

Bog snapped his crooked teeth in Sunny's face, causing the elf to cringe. "I can't even imagine being a tiny, wee, stubby, useless, clawless, wingless little clod like you. I have no idea what Dawn even sees in you!"

"Hey, hey, hey," Sunny shot back. "Not cool, man! And anyway, if I'm so useless, how'd I manage to get all the way through the Dark Forest, into your castle, and back out, _twice_ , without you catching me, huh?"

"To steal a _love potion_ that you planned on using on Dawn! A few cheap tricks and some gymnastics don't make you a hero."

"Well, at least I didn't kidnap her and lock her up in a dungeon like some slimy villain. Seriously, man, who does that? I'd rather be an elf any day than a bad-tempered, spiky, meanie goblin who locks people up! Maybe, _I_ don't see what Marianne sees in you!"

Marianne and Dawn arrived back at the impromptu construction site to find their boyfriends on the verge of pummeling each other.

"Hey, hey, hey, whoa," Marianne shouted, darting between them. "We leave you two alone for five minutes and you're trying to rip each other's heads off. What is going on?"

Sunny and Bog glared back at her with equally vitriolic expressions. "He started it!" they both said simultaneously, which prompted them to return to glaring at one another.

Marianne held them apart. "I don't care who started it, but I'm going to finish it if you two don't cut it out right now."

Dawn gave them both her disappointed doe-eyes. "Come on, this is supposed to be an opportunity for all of us to work together and get to know each other better. It's more fun working with friends."

"Yeah, who says I'm friends with any two-pint elf?"

"That's right, maybe I don't want to be friends with a hulking stick bug goblin!"

"Boys," Marianne growled in her don't-push-my-buttons voice.

"Here," Dawn said, landing next to Sunny. "Why don't Sunny and I work on finishing the framework? Bog, you can go with Marianne to finish gathering the stuff for the caulking. OK?"

"Fine," both boys muttered sullenly.

As Marianne and Bog took off, the fairy gave the goblin a sharp elbow in the ribs. "You're going to have to learn to be nice to him eventually, you know."

Bog just snorted.

Back on the roof, Dawn gave Sunny a pleading look. "I know he's prickly, but can't you at least _try_ to work with him. He's very likely going to be your brother-in-law one day, so you might as well try getting along with him sooner rather than later."

Sunny shook his head. "And what am I supposed to do if he doesn't _want_ to get along?"

Dawn started unwinding a coil of twine. "Then I guess that means you'll just have to be the bigger man, Sunny."

Sunny snorted and muttered, "Haha, funny. There are a lot of words you could use to compare me to that goblin, but I'm pretty sure "bigger" is never going to one of them."


	2. Switched! (Bog)

Part 2: Switched! (Bog)

The Bog King grumbled to himself as he groggily became aware of the world. Strange dreams had waltzed around in his mind all night, leaving him in a disoriented fog. Light slanted in through the window above his nest and dust motes floated in the pale yellow beams of early morning. Bog yawned, blinking and trying to adjust his eyes, which were blurry and out of focus. He shook his head, trying to dispel the sleepy haze in his mind and the eerie echoes of the weird dreams that he couldn't quite remember now.

Vaguely, a thought skittered through his mind. _I don't have a window above my nest._

He yawned again and began stretching his arms above his head, arching his back to work out the cricks that invariably built up in his spine.

 _Wait, WHAT?_

Bog abruptly snapped into full wakefulness.

He looked around. The room he was in was small – ridiculously small – with a slightly domed roof and clay daub walls. It was decorated with a weird assortment of little knick-knacks: a small glass bauble with glitter inside, a row of beetle figurines lined up on a shelf, several boutonnieres stuck to the wall, and a hat stitched from a ladybug shell hanging on a peg. Bog blinked at the inexplicable sight, his mind still working sluggishly. Above him, he could see the reed frame of the roof, a patched reed frame that looked oddly familiar…

He was in Sunny's house.

Why in the bloody skies was he in Sunny's house?

For that matter, how had he even fit through the door?

He sat up with a groan, still glancing around in bewilderment that was rapidly transforming into irritation. That was when he noticed he'd been lying on a mushroom, one that was really far too small for him to have been comfortably sleeping on. With a growing sense of discomfort, he lifted his hands to rub them across his face, as if to scrub the weirdness away.

He froze at the sight of his hands. They were small and stubby, clawless, brown instead of grey-skinned, and four-fingered. They were definitely, definitely, _definitely_ NOT his hands.

Frantically, Bog lifted the hands-that-weren't-his to his face. His nose had shrunk to a soft little blob, his cheeks were full and round, and his eyes were way too big. Further exploration determined that his head was capped with an enormous tuft of unruly, wiry hair.

Bog almost fell off the mushroom. His limbs were too short, his body too small. He nearly tripped over his misshapen feet and caught himself on the wall. There was a small mirror hanging in an alcove on the far wall, and Bog stumbled awkwardly towards it and gaped at his reflection.

Sunny's flabbergasted face stared back at him.

Bog gave a strangled yell that was too high-pitched, stumbled back a step, tripped, and fell backwards onto his rear end.

This had to be a dream. This had to be some horrible continuation of the weird fantasies that had haunted him last night during his sleep. There was no way he was Sunny.

He growled and punched himself in the jaw, hoping to startle himself out of the dream. He yelped instead and cradled his now-throbbing cheek as he discovered that elf skin was not nearly as tough as goblin hide. Shaking with a combination of indignation and growing panic, Bog sat down unsteadily on the edge of the mushroom bed once again.

"Sunny? Suuuunny, are you awake?"

Dawn's sing-song voice came from the other side of the door, along with knocking.

Bog cursed, which again came out in Sunny's high-pitched squeak, and scrabbled backwards. He couldn't let anyone see him like this! What was this going to do for his image of the fierce, terrifying, evil king of the Dark Forest?

"Sunny, are you there? It's a looooovely day and I've got a picnic lunch!"

Bog stared at the door in mounting horror, desperately trying to contrive an escape plan or at the very least a plausible excuse to make Dawn go away, when he realized the front door was not latched. He leapt up, misjudged the length of his legs, and went sprawling face-first into a potted azalea, producing a loud clatter.

"Sunny, I know you're in there. I'm coming in!"

"NO!" Bog squawked, attempting to untangle himself from the plant, but it was too late. The door flew open.

"Sunny Wunny!"

He was attacked by a huge creature that wrapped its long arms around him and nearly lifted him off his feet. Gigantic monarch wings flapped gleefully in his face and dandelion fluff hair tickled in his ear. He spluttered and struggled as Dawn gave him a loud "mwah" of a kiss on the cheek.

"Auuuurrrgghh, Dawn, Dawn, Dawn, STOP! It's me. STOP!"

Dawn released him and gave him an odd look. "Well, of course it's you," she said. "I can see that." She paused, her eyes trailing slowly over the smudge of potting soil smeared across his cheek. "Are you OK? You look, I don't know, a little rumpled. I didn't wake you up, did I?"

Bog shook himself, trying to get his wits back after being suddenly tackled by a Dawn who was now twice his size. Bloody tree spirits, and he'd thought she was intimidating when she was only _half_ his size!

She tried to kiss him again, but he fended her off with a yelp. Dawn frowned, putting her hands on her hips. "What's the matter with you, Sunny? Are we not going on the picnic now?"

Bog's head was still spinning. "Dawn, you've got to listen to me," he said seriously. "I'm not Sunny. I'm…I'm Bog."

Dawn bit her lip and he could see she was trying to hide a smile. "Oh Sunny, that's cute, but you know I only thought of Bog that way because I was love dusted." She poked him in the chest. "The love potion that _you_ tossed in my face. But anyway, I like you being you, my widdle, sweet Sunny Wunny Bunny Boo."

She attempted to rub her nose against his. Bog nearly gagged. OK, he was never, ever, _ever_ going to complain about "Boggy Woggy" again.

"No, no, no, Dawn, stop. It's actually me. I'm Bog. I'm stuck in Sunny's body, and I don't know how it happened or how to get out!"

The expression on Dawn's face was half-bewildered, half-concerned now. "You didn't fall out of your bed onto your head again, did you?"

"No!"

"Or eat a mushroom that disagreed with you?"

"No!"

"Of fall out of a bush…?"

"Dawn!"

"Or-"

"Dawn, will you listen to me for one bloody second!"

The fairy princess looked taken aback by his tone, but she did stop talking. Bog scrunched up his face, one hand on his forehead. "Look, I…I can _prove_ to you that I really am Bog. Ask me a question that only Bog would know."

Dawn pursed her lips. "Okaaaaaay, what did I ask Bog to help with last summer for Sunny's surprise birthday party?"

Bog rolled his eyes. "Dawn, Sunny would know that. He was there are the party and knows that I helped with the lights for the karaoke stage."

"Shoot, you're right." Dawn made an annoyed, scrunchy face that Bog would have found amusing in another circumstance. "Ummm. Oooo! Here's one!" She gave Bog what she clearly thought was a piercing stare, which involved sticking her lower lip out and squinting her eyes. "In the dungeons when I was love dusted, what did Bog threaten to do if I wouldn't stop singing?"

Bog scratched his chin, grimaced in surprise when his fingers touched tufted fuzz instead of thorny goblin skin, and scowled as he tried to recall the moment. "I…er…threatened to rip your wings off."

Bog would have thought it impossible for Dawn's eyes to get any bigger, but they certainly did. Her hand flew to her mouth. "You really _are_ Bog," she gasped dramatically.

"I've been saying that for the last several minutes," Bog grumbled.

Dawn's jaw set in a determined line, and for a moment, Bog caught a glint in her eyes that marked her unmistakably as Marianne's sister. "We've got to do something to get you back. Wait!" Her eyes widened again. "Do you think Sunny is stuck in _your_ body?"

Bog had been so preoccupied with his own predicament that he hadn't considered this possibility. He gritted his teeth. "If that elf scratches so much as one scale, I'm gonna-URK!"

He yelped as Dawn grabbed him and drug him towards the door. "We've got to find Marianne. She'll know what to do."

All Bog could do was stumble along after her on his stubby legs, hoping very, very much that Marianne would indeed know what to do, because he most certainly didn't.


	3. Switched! (Sunny)

Part 3: Switched! (Sunny)

"What!? No! _I_ didn't let Lizzie into the strawberry patch," Sunny mumbled under his breath. "Why would I do that? I like strawberries…"

He rolled onto his back. Something pinched sharply, causing him to startle awake with a short yelp of "I didn't do it!"

Groggily, he stared up at the ceiling above him, blinking slowly and still aware that something was jabbing uncomfortably in the middle of his back. He wriggled a little, trying to ease the pinch, and realized his neck was also strangely stiff. He rolled his shoulders and head, still attempting to fix the unpleasant pressure, which was when he jabbed himself in the cheek…with his shoulder. He made a strangled sound and sat bolt upright, clutching his face.

Blankly, he stared around the room that he found himself in. Dark, wooden walls decorated only by creeping vines, a tall window looking out over twisted tree branches, the sides of some sort of weird nest thing that he was lying in. He blinked again. Dark Forest vibes, definitely Dark Forest vibes. Sunny shuddered. He still didn't like the Dark Forest. In fact, despite the new treaty between the Fairy Meadows and the Dark Forest, he hadn't actually set foot beyond the border since last Spring when the whole love potion thing went down and he'd spent several weeks helping the goblins with their new castle as recompense for the part he'd played in the whole fiasco. After two weeks of dodging clumsy, rough-housing goblins with toothy grins and avoiding the ferocious glares that their king directed at him every time they crossed paths, he'd never been so happy to be back home in the meadows. The Bog King _still_ freaked him out, to be honest. He didn't care if the goblin ruler was courting Princess Marianne; he still got the feeling that Dawn was the only thing keeping Bog from gleefully feeding him to Brutus anytime they happened across each other.

"Dawn? Dawn, is this some sort of joke?" he hissed. His voice came out rough and scratchy. He tried to clear his throat. "Marianne? Dawn? …Dawn?"

There was no reply.

His cheek was still hurting. Now that he thought about it, how in the world had he jabbed his shoulder into his cheek hard enough to hurt like that. He dabbed his fingers against the sore area and felt sticky dampness. He was bleeding?

He jerked his hand away to look for traces of blood and froze. The hand that hovered in front of his face was something out of a nightmare: huge, long, gnarly fingers, cruel, curved claws…

"Oh no, nonononononono," he muttered frantically, wringing the hand as if he could shake it off. He scrabbled backwards across rolls of moss, sending up flurries of the downy feathers that lined the nest. Some part of his body caught on something, sending him sprawling sideways, his arms flailing. His hand knocked into something hard that had been leaning against the side of the nest, causing it to fall with a resounding crash that made Sunny cringe before he peeked over the nest's edge.

The Bog King's staff lay on the floor beside the nest, still vibrating from its fall.

"Dream, dream, dream, this is a bad dream. Not real, not real," Sunny muttered, trying to keep from hyperventilating. "You are _totally not_ the Bog King. You are _totally not_ stuck in Bog's body." He shifted slightly, and the wing that he'd been laying on – the source of the pinch that had woken him – came free with violent pins and needles that caused Sunny to cringe with a little whimper. "…You _are totally_ stuck in Bog's body. Oh man, this is bad."

"Really?" he yelled at the gloomy, dark, depressing room, then cringed and clapped a hand over his mouth when his voice echoed far more than he'd expected. With a hand still over his mouth, his eyes darted back and forth as if expecting a horde of goblins to charge him out of the darkness any second. When nothing stirred, he slapped his cheeks several times, trying to get a grip on himself, and shuddered when he felt the thorny stubble that now peppered his face.

"Come on, come on, think," he continued to mutter to himself. "There's gotta be a solution. What do I do? What do I do? What do I do?"

Someone knocked on the door to the chamber, causing Sunny to dive back down into the nest with a squeak. "Sweetie!" a loud, stringent voice called from the other side of the door. "Shouldn't you be getting up, honey? Your blueberry oatmeal is going cold."

The Bog King ate _blueberry oatmeal_ for breakfast? Sunny felt his lips twitch with amusement for just a second before he remembered the predicament he was in. "Oh uh, yeah, yeah, I'll be there in a moment," he called, then squeezed his eyes shut, hoping Griselda wouldn't notice anything amiss about his voice.

"Well, all right. I didn't raise you to spend half the morning lying around daydreaming and letting your breakfast go cold. I'm coming back in five minutes if you don't get your kingly butt downstairs by then."

"Right, right, I'll…I'll be there," he called back, still with his eyes squeezed shut, hoping that would be enough to get her to leave.

"You better," the gobliness on the other side of the door retorted. "There's no way I'm letting my son show up late to a date." Then, as he heard her trundling away, he let out his breath slowly.

Very, very carefully, he climbed out of the nest. The goblin king's body was like a briar patch: with every move he made, some spike or claw or scale seemed to catch on something. He extricated himself successfully from the nest at last and stood unsteadily on the stilt-like legs that unfolded underneath him. He wobbled awkwardly, feeling his breath catch at how ridiculously far down the floor seemed. When he moved, the scales rubbed together in a way that made him cringe. Even if Bog's body was covered in his plated armor, Sunny was still painfully and awkwardly aware that he wasn't wearing any clothes.

And Dawn _hugged_ this thing regularly? How had she not shredded herself by now? For that matter, how was _Marianne_ not shredded by now? Actually, nope, that was something Sunny very definitely didn't want to think about. Nope, nope, nope.

Wait… Marianne… What had Griselda said? Something about a date? Bog had a date with Marianne this morning? Marianne! Maybe she would have some idea of how to fix this mess. Well, she certainly couldn't have _less_ of an idea than he did right now. He looked around furtively – was the real Bog King still lurking around somewhere…or had they, like, switched bodies or something? Sunny shuddered at the thought. He needed to find someone who could help him figure out what the heck was going on, and fast.

But first, he needed to _get_ to the Fairy Meadows.

Cautiously, he opened the door and peeked out. Outside was a dark passageway that smelled strongly of soil and goblin. There were no windows. Wrinkling his nose, Sunny began to slowly make his way down the hall, which was lit only by the occasional spiked, glowing orb hanging from the ceiling. Stupid goblins and their stupid dark aesthetic. Seriously, why was the Bog King so obsessed with spiky, scary-looking stuff? Did it make him somehow feel better about the fact that he was pretty much a walking, talking pincushion himself?

He made it to the end of the hallway without running into any goblins. Stairs spiraled downwards into more dimly-lit darkness. Several times, he nearly tripped over the long, gangly legs now attached to his body and narrowly escaped a loud, awkward, and very likely painful tumble down the stairs by clutching the side rail that was fashioned from woven ivy vines.

At the bottom of the stairs, he picked up the scent of oatmeal. Thanking his lucky stars that at the very least Bog seemed to have an excellent sense of smell, he crept forward carefully, trying to keep Bog's scales from rattling as he inched past the door to what appeared to be a dining hall. Griselda was fussing about with a stack of doilies on the opposite side of the room, her back to him.

A bowl of oatmeal sat on the table, smelling good enough that Sunny's stomach (Bog's stomach?) growled. Beyond the dining room lay the throne room, and from there, Sunny remembered the way out from the weeks he'd spent helping the goblins with the new castle. Just another inch and he'd be in the clear…

The long spur that jutted out from his elbow caught on a vine behind him as he tried to scuttle past the door. The painting hanging from the vine of a tall goblin with Bog's staff swung wildly and Sunny made a grab for it. Unfortunately, he misjudged the reach of Bog's arm, whacked the painting instead, and the thing went flying with a loud clatter to the floor.

"And what do you think you're doing skulking around in the hallway?" Three unrelentingly strong fingers seized his arm and dragged him unceremoniously into the dining room and to the seat in front of the oatmeal. "Now, you told me last night that you were going to take a look at that spider nest over by the reception hall."

Sunny stared at the beady-eyed goblin woman standing across the table from him with a hand on her hip, gave a nervous giggle that meant _I have no idea what to say_ , glanced down at the bowl in front of him, and began shoveling oatmeal into his mouth as fast as he could to avoid having to come up with a real answer.

Griselda harrumphed and gave him a severe look. "You've _said_ you'd deal with it for the last three days now. It's almost covering the entire entrance. Do you want all our guests to think we're savages?"

Sunny shook his head emphatically and shoved more oatmeal in his mouth.

"Well, that powrie chieftain from the nettle groves is going to be here in _two days_ , and he'd better not have to walk through a spider web. Honey, don't get me wrong, I'm delighted you enjoy the time you spend with Marianne, but if you keep staying over in those meadows so late that you can't get up in the morning to do your job, I'm going to have to give you a curfew. You may have a girlfriend now but you're still a king too."

Sunny nodded vigorously, reaching for another spoonful of oatmeal.

Griselda reached out and stopped his hand. "You're not sassing me, are you, young man? And dear jumping frogs, what's happened to your manners? Shoveling food in your face without saying a word, pssshaw. If I didn't know better, I-"

Griselda cut herself off sharply, leaned forward, and unceremoniously grabbed Sunny's face, causing him to yelp in surprise. " _What_ did you _do_ to your cheek!?"

Sunny raised a hand self-consciously to the wound. "Oh, er, I _uhhhh_ , rolled over…wrong," he stammered.

Griselda sighed the long-suffering sigh of an exasperated mother. "How many times have I told you not to sleep on your side? You always end up with the worst cricks in your neck too. Oh, come here, sweetie. Stop struggling."

She spit on her fingers and proceeded to scrub at the bloody smudge on his cheek, while Sunny gurgled in protest. Every moment that passed, the Bog King's image was becoming slightly less intimidating.

Griselda released him and shook her head. "All right, honey, you better get going or you'll be late. Here, I made up a parcel of those honey drops that Marianne likes for you to take. Don't eat 'em all on the way there." She shoved a small box in his hands. "Now you go and enjoy yourself, but don't wear yourself out. You've still got that spider nest to take care of when you get back. Now shoo, shoo, shoo."

Moments later, Sunny found himself at the entrance to the throne room, feeling like he'd gone through a whirlwind. "Now say hello to Marianne for me, honey, and fly safe," Griselda called airily, waving a doily at him before turning and trundling back into the dining hall.

Sunny let out a long, wheezing breath that he hadn't realized he was holding and made an ungainly dash across the throne room, heading for the main entrance, the parcel of honey drops clutched to his chest. Freedom was in sight!

"Sire!"

Sunny almost ran smack-bang into Bog's two henchgoblins who seemed to pop out of nowhere right in front of him. He barely caught himself from tumbling forward right on top of them. Both goblins stood at attention.

"News from the mushrooms," the taller of the two announced.

"Uhhhhhh," Sunny said, not sure how he was supposed to react.

"You tell him," the taller goblin muttered to the other.

"I always tell him," the shorter one replied.

"Well then, it makes sense that you tell him this time too."

"I guess you're right."

They both snapped back to attention. The shorter goblin puffed out his chest and announced in a pompous voice, "A shooter and dumb hairy fishes will sneak for you."

Sunny gaped at the two of them, completely nonplussed. Both goblins cringed slightly as if anticipating a wrathful response. "Uhhhhh, that's greeeeeeat," Sunny said.

The two goblins blinked.

"It is?" the shorter one said hesitantly.

"Yeeeeeah," Sunny continued, trying to shimmy his way past them. "Yeah, you tell the…uh… _fishes_ to have a good time sneaking. Good to know. Yeah, so I've really got to get going. Guess I'll see you guys later. Hahaha."

"Sire, are you OK," the taller goblin asked, peering suspiciously at him. "You don't seem quite like yourself."

Sunny attempted a bright smile, which only made the two goblins look even more baffled. "I'm GREAT! I mean, I'm…yeaaahhh, I'm just going to go now." And with that he bolted for the entrance.

Once he was past the gate and far enough into the forest that he wasn't visible from the castle, he stopped to huff for a moment and get a sense of direction. The new castle wasn't far from the border, but the undergrowth was thick and there were the briar walls to get past. Also, the fewer goblins he ran into on his way out, the better. "Great, this is just great," he muttered. "If this is someone's idea of a joke, it's not funny. Usually, I don't mind a joke or two, but this is just ridiculous."

He took a few steps forward and almost instantly his wings tangled on a vine, jerking him backwards.

Wait, he had wings!

He could _fly_ to the Fairy Meadows!

He spread the wings cautiously, the one still twinging from when he'd pinched it that morning when he'd rolled on top of it. He gave all four appendages an experimental buzz.

OK, this couldn't be too hard. Dawn and Marianne flew all the time. You just flapped them and they lifted you off the ground. Right?

He buzzed the wings a little harder, experimenting with how they pivoted. Almost instantly, he began to lift off the ground.

"WOAH!" He panicked as he felt his feet left the ground and fell back to the forest floor, stumbling as he landed. He shook his head, trying to steel himself. "OK, it's not hard. You've flown on dragonflies since you were little. This isn't different at all. Not any different at all. Now, you're gonna flap the wings and go…NOW!"

He rose up in the air suddenly and slammed his head into a branch. Back on the ground once again and rubbing his head ruefully, Sunny groaned. "Except dragonflies actually know what they're doing. Man, I hope the Bog King doesn't mind a few bruises when he gets his body back."

~o~o~o~

Sunny gave a massive sigh of relief when he finally caught a glimpse of green grass between the dark trees. Renewing his efforts one last time, he buzzed unsteadily towards the archway that connected the two kingdoms, managing somehow not to bump into any of the twisting roots. Huffing a little, he landed awkwardly, still feeling shaken but also rather proud of his accomplishment. Now that he was out of the Dark Forest, he should be able to find someone who could help him.

Rubbing the arm that he'd accidentally whacked against a stump on the way there, he stared out over the Fairy Meadows, absently wondering where he should head from here.

Something touched his back between his wings. White hot electricity shot through his body all the way to his fingertips and toes, causing him to leap into the air with a yowl, nearly twisting an ankle in the process. He heard a devious giggle from behind him. "Hmmm, looks like someone's ready to see me."

Sunny whirled around. Marianne was perched on the rock behind him, swinging her legs nonchalantly, wings half-flared and catching the light. For a moment, Sunny sagged with relief that he'd found help without having to fly further, but then he caught the gleam in the fairy princess's eyes. Sunny felt the grateful greeting freeze in his throat and he instinctively stumbled back a step.

Marianne in turn slid down from the rock and began to sashay after him, that truly terrifying glitter in her eyes making Sunny swallow nervously. "M…Marianne…?" he started before he felt himself bump into a tree stump, bringing his retreat to an abrupt halt.

Marianne continued to saunter lazily towards him, as he pressed himself frantically back against the wooden barrier behind him. The elder princess reached out and slid her fingers down the front of his chest, still devouring him with her eyes. "Just where do you think you're trying to go, almighty king," she asked in a voice that was nothing short of a purr.

Sunny was frozen with absolute horror. He so totally did _not_ need to know that this was the way Marianne acted when she was alone with Bog.

"Marianne," he attempted to squeak again, but Marianne chose that moment to run her hands back up his chest to hook her arms over his shoulders, pulling herself close.

"Somebody feeling a little shy today, hmm," she teased, her fingers tickling up the back of his neck.

"M…Marianne, you…you really don't want to do this," he stuttered. "I promise, you do _not_ want to do this."

Marianne's purple lips twisted into a truly wicked smirk. "Oh, I think I do."

Without further ado, she pulled his head down and pressed a very passionate kiss to his lips.

Sunny flailed, but Marianne had a grip like iron. A thousand panicked thoughts raced through his head. _Oh skies, oh skies, oh skies, when Marianne finds out the truth, she's gonna kill me. And then the Bog King's gonna kill me. And then Dawn's gonna kill whatever's left of me. I'm dead, I'm so dead!"_

As if right on cue, there was an outraged howl from behind them. "MARIANNE!"

Marianne gave a startled jerk and pulled away, nearly dropping Sunny. They both whirled around. Hovering several feet away was a confused and embarrassed-looking Dawn. Beside her, on the ground, Sunny found himself staring at a perfect copy of himself, a copy that looked like it was about to tear him limb from limb.

Sunny slumped in utter defeat. Yup, he was so totally dead.


	4. Well, This Is Confusing

Part 4: Well, This Is Confusing

"What do you think you're doing, kissing _my_ girlfriend? Back off!" an uncharacteristically aggressive Sunny snarled, eyes flashing ferociously.

"Hey, hey, hey, _she_ kissed _me_!" an uncharacteristically defensive Bog shot back, cringing slightly and putting up his hands in a show of innocence.

"Well, you weren't trying very hard to tell her the truth, were you, you sneaking elf?"

"I tried, I did try, and it didn't work! And I am _scarred for life_ now, thank you very much!"

"SHUT UP BOTH OF YOU!" Marianne bellowed.

Both Bog and Sunny fell silent.

Marianne glared back and forth between the goblin and the elf, hands on her hips, eyes narrowed. "Now, what is going on? And it had better be good."

Dawn, Bog, and Sunny all started talking at once.

"I went to Sunny's house for our picnic and Sunny was there, but he wasn't Sunny…"

"I was minding my own business and now I am STUCK in this ridiculous, tiny body…"

"Man, do you know how _terrifying_ Bog's mom is? Like seriously…"

Marianne cut them all off once again. She pointed at her sister. "Dawn, what the heck is all this about?"

Dawn took a deep breath. "Well, Sunny and I were supposed to go on a picnic this morning, but Sunny says he's Bog, not Sunny, which I thought was pretty weird. But, like, he can answer questions that only Bog should be able to answer, so I think he really is Bog, and they've, like, switched bodies or something."

Marianne raised an eyebrow. "OK, is this a joke, because it is way too early for jokes."

"NO!" all three shouted emphatically.

Marianne raised her hands. "OK, OK." She pointed at the elf. "So, you're telling me that he's actually Bog?"

"Yep, I asked him about him threatening to rip my wings off in the dungeon and he totally knew the answer!"

"You threatened to rip her wings off!?" Bog (Sunny?) yelled in outraged horror.

"Well, I had to find _some_ way of getting her to shut up, seeing as _someone_ tossed a love potion in her face!"

"That's still a mean thing to say to a poor, innocent princess!"

"Hey, I can take care of myself!" Dawn huffed, putting her hands on her waist, orange wings flaring.

Marianne still didn't look entirely convinced that the three of them weren't attempting to pull her leg, a highly skeptical slant to her eyebrows. She cut the trio off again and pointed at the one that looked like Sunny. "Uh OK, Bog, what did I find out that you like on our last date?"

The elf's eyes narrowed then widened with a look of indignant horror. "MARIANNE, you can't ask that. That's private!"

"Well then, if you know the answer, I'll know it's really you."

Grumbling, the elf drug a hand down his face in a very Bog-like gesture before muttering, "I…I like it when you nibble on my ears."

"Ooo, Sunny likes that too," Dawn said brightly.

"DAWN!" the one that looked like Bog cried in a mortified voice.

"Oh oops, sorry Sunny Wunny."

"OK, OK, I believe everyone," Marianne said, waving her hands to get their attention once again. She pinched the bridge of her nose in a summons for patience. "OK, so do either of you know how it happened?"

"No clue, last night I went to bed like I always do, and the next thing I know I'm in the Dark Forest stuck inside this spiky monstrosity. Like, how do you actually _live_ in this thing, man?"

"I have no bloody idea. One moment I was my normal self, and the next I'm the size of a wingless acorn."

"Well, that's…not helpful at all," Marianne muttered. She sighed heavily. "If we have no idea what made it happen in the first place, then we have no way of figuring out how to get you both back in the right bodies again."

Everyone fell grimly silent as the stark reality of Marianne's words sunk in.

"Oh, oh, I have an idea!" Dawn interjected suddenly, her wings fluttering with excitement. "What about the Sugar Plum Fairy?"

"What about her?"

"Well, she knows all sorts of stuff about potions and magic, so maybe she'd have idea about what happened and how to fix it."

Marianne brightened. "Hey, that's actually not a bad idea."

"Sugar Plum, Sugar Plum Fairy." Sunny wrinkled his (Bog's?) brow, tapping a finger on his chin. "That reminds me of something, but what was it? Sugar Plum, Sugar Plum, Sugar Plum." He straightened suddenly, jabbing his hand in the air. "Aha, that's it! Shooter dumb hairy!"

Marianne glanced sideways at Dawn. "Are you _sure_ they really have switched bodies and they're not just, you know, drunk?"

"No, no, no," Sunny said. "Shooter and dumb hairy fishes. It was the message from the mushrooms. 'A shooter and dumb hairy fishes will sneak for you.' That was the message."

"Geesh, you still haven't fixed the mushroom line, I see?" Marianne said with a raised eyebrow and a glance at Bog.

A very goblinish scowl crossed the elf face. "I've…had other things on my mind lately."

"ANYWAY," Sunny said, shooting a reprimanding glare at the two of them, "before I was so rudely interrupted… I thought it sounded like something that might make sense if you changed it around a bit. And when Dawn mentioned the Sugar Plum Fairy it clicked. I think it might have meant 'The Sugar Plum Fairy wishes to speak with you.' What do you think?"

"Oo, I think you're right," Dawn said.

"It could be," Marianne mused. "Anyway, I think Plum is probably our best bet."

"If that meddlesome, magic-fingered trouble-brewer is behind me having to stumble around in this stumpy body all morning, I'm going to stick her in a cage so dark and deep she'll never see the light of day again," Bog growled.

Dawn patted the top of his head. "Aw, don't be mean. We don't even know that she had anything to do with it, but she might have answers that could help us. And there are a lot worse things that could have happened to you, you know, Boggy."

"Bog," the goblin-in-elf-form grumbled.

Marianne raised an amused eyebrow and jerked her head towards the elf. "OK, well that one's definitely Bog. There's no doubt about that now."

She squared her shoulders and turned to face the Dark Forest. "Well, to find the Sugar Plum Fairy it is then. Come on."

And with that, the four of them headed into the forest in search of the illusive fairy.


End file.
